Losing Hope
by Incensio Lady
Summary: Bug is getting married and Nigel wishes he didn’t have to go. BugNigel.


The night before Bug's wedding, Nigel got drunk, he had a vague idea that he could maybe get himself drunk enough that he could forget what was going to happen tomorrow. Maybe even drunk enough that he'd sleep and miss it all.

Nigel stared moodily into his glass, wouldn't do for the best man to not show up though, especially if the reason that he'd drunk himself into a stupor was to forget that he was in love with the groom.

He'd always been there beside him, through breakdowns and breakups and up mountainsides and despite Lily, Nigel had always held onto what was now proving to be a heartbreaking hope that maybe Bug wasn't quite as straight as he seemed.

Nigel supposed he should be keeping Bug company, joking around and teasing his friend about his soon to be entrapment. He should have but didn't have the energy for it today, he just wanted to drink until he couldn't picture Bug and Lily in his mind's eye anymore. Barring that he just wanted to be able to mope, something which would have been a bit of a give away in Bug's presence.

Nigel thudded his head back against the couch rhythmically.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Timing the bangs with the beat of his heart. He would do anything not to have to be there tomorrow, not to have to hear Bug promise to keep her for the rest of his life, not to see Bug smile when they are declared man and wife.

The whisky was burning well enough now, the edges of everything blurred as Nigel slammed back another glass and the drink sloshed over the rim of the cup as he refilled it clumsily.

Nigel's drunken brain started searching for reasons he couldn't attend the wedding tomorrow. He was working! Nigel frowned, except Garret had brought in Locums for the entire coroner's staff.

He was sick! Except Bug would see through that in a minute and demand a reason for his faking.

A family member died! Nigel was elated for a moment before he realized that they were all investigators and that Bug knew him well enough to know that he wasn't close enough to any of his family to rush home for their funeral.

Nigel laid his head in his hands, the only way he was getting out of this was if he was dead.

Dead.

The idea seemed wonderfully simple to Nigel's drunken mind. If he were dead he wouldn't have to be there. Some small part of Nigel's brain tried to intervene but couldn't quite make it to the surface.

Nigel staggered and almost fell as he pushed himself to his feet. He tumbled sideways into a counter as he made his way into the kitchen. Opening the knife drawer was inexplicably harder then he remembered and it fumbled with it for almost a minute before he got it.

The knife his hand fell on was a slim filleting knife, that was so sharp that you almost couldn't feel it splitting you skin.

Nigel took a step back towards the couch and after swaying dangerously decided just to sit where he was, back pressed up against the kitchen cabinet, cold from the tiles beneath him stealing his warmth.

Nigel didn't stop to have second thoughts, he just pressed the knife lengthways down his wrist, positioning it carefully above the artery.

The skin split as easily as meat always had and Nigel barely felt pain through the near catatonic haze of his drunkenness. He didn't bother with the other wrist, the artery cut was doing its job and blood was already forming a glittering warm pool against the tile, little rivers running out along the grout lines.

The cold of the tile started creeping further up his body and Nigel shivered, then he couldn't stop. A purely analytical part of his mind informed him that he was in shock and the cold was from the blood loss.

Then suddenly Nigel was sure he could hear Bug's voice, it sounded far away and kind of hazy and so Nigel settled back to listen to his own imaginings of Bug while he died.

Nigel frowned as Bug's voice got louder and more annoyed.

"You're supposed to be in love with me in my mind, not angry." Nigel informed Imaginary Bug sensibly as Imaginary Bug's voice was joined by jingling keys.

Imaginary Bug was threatening him now.

"You better have a good reason for making me come looking for you on my the night before my wedding, Nige." And Nigel frowned again but everything was getting hazy and incoherent and his eyes started drifting shut.

A new sound joined his world and Nigel's eyes fluttered open for a moment as the door opened.

Bug looked like art, framed by the doorway and frozen in space.

Nigel tried to smile at him but he was so tired and his eyes just drifted shut again.

Bug must have broken his tableau because Nigel could feel movement around him and something pressed against his wrist. Then Bug was speaking again and a faraway part of Nigel's brain assumed he was calling 911.

A hand slapped against Nigel's face and it shocked his eyes open. Bug was leaning over him and he looked so worried that Nigel just wanted to hug him. His lips were moving too and it took a second for Nigel to connect the movement with the sound.

"- you think you're doing, you idiot!"

Nigel's slurring was even worse with the blood loss, but he thought Bug understood him.

"Dying."

Bug suddenly looked like he wanted to hit him, so Nigel assumed he'd got it.

"Why the hell would you do that?" Bug's hands gripped even harder on the makeshift bandage on Nigel's arm.

The pain brought Nigel closer to lucidity but he still didn't see any reason not to answer the question.

"'Cause you were getting married."

Nigel watched Bug's face move from confused to shocked to something he couldn't quite identify in the space of a few seconds. It was an interesting puzzle but his eyes were sliding shut again and so he ignored it.

Bug squeezed his wound again and Nigel weakly batted his free arm at him.

"Stopit." He muttered.

Bug squeezed again, harder this time.

"Hold on Nige, just stay awake for me." He was shaking Nigel's shoulder now and it was making him feel a little nauseous.

Nigel opened his eyes with effort and looked up at Bug again and just said one word.

"Why?"

The clench on his wound this time didn't seem intentional and Nigel thought he saw Bug beat back a sob.

"Because you can't just throw this on me and die. You can't leave me."

Nigel sighed and relaxed further back against the cabinets, eyes falling further shut and the world becoming more hazy, there were sirens in the background and Nigel wondered vaguely what they would find when they arrived. He patted Bug's hand on his arm blindly and answered.

"You have Lily."

Even his own mind was going black when Bug answered, it was almost lost in the buzzing of his ears but he still heard it.

"But I could have had you."

Nigel blacked out.

* * *

The morning of Bug's wedding Nigel woke in a hospital bed with Bug asleep in a chair by his side. He felt hung-over and in pain and yet elated for a reason that was just out of reach.

Bug just stirred in his sleep.


End file.
